With two young kids, Halloween has shifted from a holiday to be celebrated after dark, to a celebration first thing in the morning! In my grogginess I served them bagels and banana ghosts (stick mini-chocolate chips in the banana for a face). Then I hopped off to school 30 minutes early to set up Jack’s class party, since I am acting as the room parent for his class this year.
The kids start the school day with a costume parade while an army of parents clutching coffee thermoses take pictures and grin. It’s one of my favorite things, to see what kinds of characters are popular and what creative costumes they have each year. I think this link will work for you to see Ben’s pictures of our kids and some of our favorite costumes. Here are our boys looking sharp:
At 9:30 am I hauled all the party supplies home, took off my wig and costume, and sat down for the first time. On days like this I’m reminded how wonderful it is to be a stay-at-home- mom who can help out with her kids’ parties at school, and also to have both kids in school, so I can have a few hours peace at home alone.
After school we watched the Curious George’s Boo-Fest (a household classic) and Adventures of Ichabod Crane (fast-forwarding through most of it to get to the spooky part). We had our traditional dinner of mummy hotdogs and jack-o-lantern quesadillas.
Finally, time to trick-or-treat! Honestly, by this point it, to me it feels like the holiday is already over. But Ben loves to take the kids out, so I got to chill at home with two bowls, one of candy and one of yarn.
Sam pooped out after about 30 minutes and I retrieved him in the car. Jack was out at least an hour, maybe 90 minutes. I think they only came home because his hands were numb. He counted his haul afterward: 120 pieces of candy. Geez. We have candy out of ears, including all the stuff we bought, as we’ve had less than half our usual number of trick-or-treaters.
Jack cried today when Sam’s class won the pumpkin splat contest (class with the most donations gets to have their pumpkins dropped 95 feet from a firetruck, other kids get to throw them off a regular ladder). Sam cried when Jack gleefully dumped and counted his MUCH larger candy haul. Emotions are running high and running out today.
The boys are happy bed in the warm jammies, singing the songs from the Nightmare Before Christmas together. Ben and I are both very tired. All in all, it was a very good Halloween this year.
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